Within the Margin

A quick one for tonight – I’m not linking to this James Hohmann piece to kick Romney when he’s a bit down, but rather because it includes some interesting historical background. I had a good sense of most of what Hohmann discusses, but I thought this description of the 1980 electoral map painted an intriguing picture of a somewhat unique moment in American politics:

“Virtually every state in the country was in play as of October 1980,” said Shirley. “Carter was campaigning in California, and Reagan was campaigning in New York City…Texas was in play. Now its routinely Republican, but Carter had taken it in 1976.”

Fewer electoral votes are in play for Romney now. The country is more polarized. Obama has a lock on certain demographics and states. There’s no chance Romney will come close in California or New York.

I think everyone knows that the map has undergone pretty significant changes over the last couple of decades, but 1980 is a great example of the extent of that. Four years earlier, Carter had won ten of the eleven states of the Confederacy. Only Virginia escaped him as he parlayed his home field advantage to almost completely undo the progress of Nixon’s Southern Strategy. By 1980, his grip on the South was fraying, and Carter could only hold onto his home state of Georgia. But most of his Southern defeats that year were quite narrow, whereas Reagan thumped him on the west coast and won most of the Great Lakes and New England, albeit by mid-single digit margins in most cases. It’s also interesting to hear of Reagan campaigning in places like New York City – not simply dropping in on a high-dollar fundraiser, but actually paying a visit to the bombed-out South Bronx in August 1980. That’s not to say Reagan was popular in the inner city, and he brought plenty of condescension with him (“Lady, I can’t help you unless I get elected.”) But he did carry the state of New York – twice – while simultaneously undoing Carter’s Southern firewall. A presidential campaign that tries to win in both the Deep South and the Empire State? Interesting times. There were no web sites where you could play with electoral math back then; it was pencil and paper stuff. But I imagine the political junkies had a good time imagining all the different scenarios to get to 270 that autumn.